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Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Grammar Day

Do you ever take shortcuts when it comes to grammar? Hey everyone, Annette here. Rather than post another quiz today, I’ve decided to offer a touch of advice.

Sometimes I get a little lazy when I’m writing. Instead of looking up a word, I’ll choose another one if I’m unsure. Or instead of dislodging the hefty Chicago Manual of Style from the shelf beside me, I’ll rework the sentence into a format I know is correct. Can you relate with this?

But what kind of service are we doing for ourselves when we avoid tracking down the right word or the right way to format something?

That’s one of the reasons I’ve enjoyed doing Grammar day here on Seriously Write. I’d choose topics I was somewhat confident in and then research to make sure I presented them correctly. Now, I have the rule lodged in this overstuffed brain of mine (overly full because I’m trying to keep track of a million things at once, not so much about intelligence busting out--grin). So, hyphens, en dashes, and em dashes became a lot more familiar, because I took the time to both look them up and study them.

The other day I could not remember the word acronym. All I could think of was acrostic. So, after debating ways of discovering the answer, or replacing the word with something else, I grabbed my Flip Dictionary and tracked it down. Yay! Now I hope to remember it. ;)

So, let’s commit to this together. Next time we are tempted to take a shortcut where grammar is concerned, let’s invest the time in looking up the answer and memorizing it. We’re serving ourselves and our readers by growing in this area. Face it, grammar is a non-negotiable, unavoidable aspect of writing. Right? Don’t avoid it. Conquer it! And write on!